On a human face, the difference of a hair’s breadth can be worlds apart.
The corners of Mai Mingle’s eyes had been pinched inward by less than a centiter, yet it was already enough to make one unwilling to look.
The skin around the corners of her eyes folded into several creases. The exposed sclera was still pristine white, without a single trace of red—as if no matter how much skin was pulled away, there was only a massive, perfectly round white orb beneath her face.
If Hai Luwei hadn’t been fully decided before, he no longer hesitated now.
Mai Mingle was too deep in the dream. Her "resident-ification" had already begun. Even if he felt a pang of sympathy, what could he possibly do?
Could he turn a resident back into a human?
In the end, they were just strangers who had t by chance.
It was a sha. Mai Mingle seed like a good person... a rarity among Hunters.
If she were an ordinary person with a terminal illness, Hai Luwei would have been willing to donate money. If she were a lonely old woman, he wouldn’t have minded volunteering to help.
But she was a Hunter.
Dying in a Nest was the fate and end that every Hunter had to be prepared for.
Hai Luwei stood frozen for a few seconds. After one last look at Mai Mingle, he finally turned and walked down the steps, one at a ti.
The resident let out a soft chuckle. "Giving up you’re finally giving up you’re scared too?"
"...Yeah."
Hai Luwei wasn’t one to deceive himself. There was no point in pretending he wasn’t afraid.
Another reason he’d decided to leave was the speed at which Mai Mingle was starting to turn into a resident. It was just too fast.
How long had the lucid dream been going on? Her two eyes were already on the verge of rging into one under the bizarre transformation.
At this rate, forget about saving her. In three to five minutes, Hai Luwei would probably be facing two residents—one in a wig, and the other being "Mai Mingle."
He didn’t know the exact mont Mai Mingle would fully transform into a resident, but he knew it could happen at any ti.
Hai Luwei had no intention of being caught off guard when it happened.
"Bye-bye," the resident said cheerfully. "Since you know what’s good for you, you’ll probably live another two or three days."
’This resident really has nothing nice to say.’
It was clearly talking to him, but Mai Mingle didn’t seem to hear a thing... ’Sigh, that’s a stupid thought. If she could still perceive the outside world, she wouldn’t be getting assimilated by the lucid dream.’
As Hai Luwei walked past the car that had crashed into the telephone pole, he noticed its trunk was still open.
He craned his neck to look inside. Aside from so junk, it was empty.
A sudden thought made him stop in his tracks. He turned and shouted, "Hey, can I ask one last question?"
"Shutupbequietareyounoisyornotnopublicdecencypublicdecencypublicdecencyno"
He’d heard even more absurd things from the mouths of residents before. Hai Luwei’s expression didn’t change; he was used to it.
"I checked the trunk, it was empty! How did you climb out of it?"
"Foolish! I never climbed out of the trunk at all."
...Huh?
When he first saw the resident, he had noticed the open trunk, so Hai Luwei had assud it ca out of there—but that was right, correlation doesn’t necessarily imply causation.
"Don’t lie to ," Hai Luwei said, testing the waters. "I checked everywhere. I never saw you."
Far away on the steps, the resident suddenly turned its head and glanced at him.
Just as he thought the resident was finally about to make a move on him, it turned with Mai Mingle and started walking up the steps, tossing a laugh over its shoulder before it went.
"I was standing in the shadows there the whole ti," it said. "You and I made eye contact face-to-face who knows how many tis... But all it takes is a ’nothing happened’ lucid dream to overwrite your mories of seeing . From your perspective, it’s like you never saw at all, isn’t it?"
’...So a lucid dream can be used like that?’
He thought it had let him go, but had he actually been a victim of a lucid dream this whole ti?
’It’s too strange. Why didn’t the resident finish the job?’
’Before Mai Mingle arrived, it could have ’digested’ and then freed itself up to deal with her, couldn’t it?’
’Or... am I still inside a lucid dream right now?’
If he kept thinking like this, Hai Luwei would soon lose his grip on whether his current self was even real. This ntal state was undoubtedly too dangerous—he hastily slapped himself across the face.
It hurt, but only after the slap did he realize a lucid dream wouldn’t be so sloppy as to leave such a loophole. The slap had been for nothing.
He looked up and saw the resident leading Mai Mingle toward the library, step by step. They were too far away for him to see if Mai Mingle’s face had deteriorated further.
’Forget it. There are countless things in this world beyond one’s control... Ti to go.’
Hai Luwei had just lifted his foot to leave when another question occurred to him.
’The resident didn’t seem to have a reason to lie... If it had been standing in the square the whole ti, why was the trunk open?’
"...Dear listeners... Today is Thursday, November 19, 2026."
When a man’s voice, interspersed with the CRACKLE of static, suddenly floated out of the night, Hai Luwei was so startled his heart nearly stopped. The voice was too close. He whipped around, but beside him was still just the empty, abandoned car.
The difference was, the screen inside the car was now glowing softly.
Nest 173 Radio
A Virtual Guide to the Infinite Illusion Realm
’Is this... is the car picking up a radio signal from the Nest? There’s a radio in the Nest?’
Hai Luwei didn’t know if this was another "domain of rules" or so trick by the resident. He warily took a few steps back, intending to walk around it.
The radio signal seed unstable, cutting out for a few seconds with a burst of static before returning. The next words rooted him to the spot.
"...The subject of today’s ’Honorable Resident Introduction’ is exceptionally capable. Its lucid dream can cause a Hunter to assimilate into any state it specifies..."
Hai Luwei had been chosen as a guide because of his rich experience, but everything that had happened tonight was beyond his comprehension.
"Make a sane person experience a descent into madness within a lucid dream, and they will truly go mad. Impressive, isn’t it? Make them believe they’re a murderer, and they will begin to enjoy killing. Of course, to us, that’s not particularly aningful.
"The Dream Screenwriter usually makes its ensnared Hunters believe they don’t exist. This way, all of the Hunter’s mories, emotions, and even their body are claid by the Dream Screenwriter as its own.
"But tonight, it has made a curious and rare choice... It plans to directly assimilate a Hunter into a resident... A resident that retains everything from its forr self, rather than being born from a re fragnt, will beco incredibly powerful, far surpassing an ordinary resident..."
’So that resident’s na is "Dream Screenwriter"?’
’Does this an that once Mai Mingle becos a resident, she’ll be far more troubleso and terrifying than a normal one?’
Hai Luwei looked up and saw the Dream Screenwriter and Mai Mingle walking far up the steps, seemingly oblivious to the broadcast from the car.
No wonder. If it had heard, it would never have allowed the car’s radio to continue broadcasting the next segnt in its entirety—
"Next, I will provide our listeners with a detailed introduction to the Dream Screenwriter’s thod of attack."
Hai Luwei didn’t know how much longer Mai Mingle could hold on.
He stared at the two figures who had paused before the library entrance, listening to the broadcast and praying that the male host would get to the point quickly.
"A lucid dream requires source material," the host said in a calm, gentle voice. "The voice, expression, speech patterns, and mannerisms of the characters in the dream... and so on. A large amount of material must first be gathered from the original person to reconstruct a convincing character in the dream.
"Furthermore, if the dream recreates people the target already knows or scenes they have already experienced, its believability increases exponentially. It becos nearly impossible for the target to escape on their own.
"After all, if you suddenly found yourself on the moon, it would be strange enough to raise suspicion. But if you were chatting with your wife in your own bedroom, that would seem perfectly normal, right?
"To this end, our Dream Screenwriter’s complentary ability allows it to make a target ’start over’ by redrawing a person’s past appearance..."
’Just say it already,’ Hai Luwei urged silently, staring at the figures on the steps. ’You’re going to say how to break the lucid dream, right?’
’Would the host really betray a resident’s secrets?’ he began to doubt.
But the broadcast didn’t disappoint him.
"Waking the target is not impossible. But the longer a sentence is, the harder it is for it to penetrate the dream. The phrases must be short enough, and repeated multiple tis, to easily slip into the lucid dream. You can think of this characteristic as short sentences generating a stronger ’pressure,’ like the point of a nail."
’No wonder. I was talking for ages just now, but Mai Mingle didn’t hear a single word. Were my sentences too long?’
"So, what’s best to say? Probably a question that can make the target notice sothing is wrong... You must lead the target to discover the discrepancy between the lucid dream and external reality... Rember, the lucid dream is built from material ’the target already perceives as reality’..."
The static from the radio grew louder, and then, with a final SHHH, the inside of the car fell silent again.
It said far too little about the most crucial part—what exactly should he say to wake Mai Mingle?
But compared to groping in the dark to discover the rules like before, Hai Luwei had to admit this was an incredibly valuable clue.
He stared at Mai Mingle’s back, then suddenly broke into a run, sprinting straight for the library steps. Taking them two at a ti, it didn’t take long for him to reach the side of the human and the resident.
’The sentences have to be short. And they have to make Mai Mingle realize the gap between the lucid dream and reality...’
’And the source material for the lucid dream was the hour or so the two of them just spent together...’
The resident whipped its head toward Hai Luwei, revealing the face of a young girl, its expression wary and annoyed. But from the neck down, it was still its own body and clothes—and there was no watch.
Hai Luwei glanced down at his own glowing children’s watch.
00:31
’I think... I think I know what to say now.’
His mind was made up. But when Hai Luwei looked at Mai Mingle, for a split second, the sight choked him and he almost forgot the question he was about to ask—
From deep within the corners of Mai Mingle’s eyes, which were now almost touching, the tips of several fingers erged. From behind her face, they were tightly pinching the skin between her eyes together.
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